My snuggle bunnies.

 

Surprise!

Sam signs surprise, one of his new favorite signs. He thought all the presents and food and friends was a surprise. He also uses this sign for Enterprise, any of the Star Trek ships. 

Ooh, Presents!

Sam loved opening presents at his birthday party. We held a book exchange, where everyone brings a wrapped book, the books get put into a pile, and then they each grab a book and open it. I like it for the way I don't have to clean up the toys afterward. Sam has more toys than any 3 boys put together, so I thought we'd try this. 

Sam and frosting

Sam liked the frosting almost as much as the cookies, and really got into the decorating. Note the Cookie Monster T-shirt. Eric thought it appropriate for Sam's party. 

Javelina Cookies

For Sam's birthday party we decorated sugar cookies cut out in a Javelina shape. (I confess, it's really a razorback, but a little frosting can disguise that) It was a lot of fun, and much sugar was consumed by all. We let the kids dig in with knives and decorate their own cookies.

On the South Rim

Last Saturday I hiked the South Rim Trail. It's a 13 mile loop through the high Chisos mountains. I've never felt up to it until now, so after 2 years of thinking about it, I just did it. We had a friend visiting from Seattle. Liz flew to the east side of the state, visited some friends and family, and then drove out to Big Bend National Park. We wanted to show her as much of the park as possible. Lucky for us, I'd bought a day of babysitting at a benefit auction around Christmas time and hadn't used it yet. So we left the kids with another family for the day and we all had fun. After our hike, we ate dinner at the lodge, then drove out to the hot spring and soaked our sore muscles for a while before picking up the kids. We had lots of fun visiting with Liz, and I hope she feels up to visiting us again. 

Eric on the South Rim. He led us on a great hike. 

Liz Weldin on the South Rim. Forgive me, Liz, but I wanted to post photographic evidence that you did indeed visit us, and survived a grueling 13 mile hike through the mountains. Let me know if you want me to remove it. 

Truck

Sam just had to drive his truck all the way back to the jeep after I picked up the mail. 

Another person through the Gap

This is a gov't pickup, driven by some park volunteers from Washington State. They were out picking up trash and checking on campsites and road conditions. 

Through the Gap

This is I think the end of the Gap, but I bet Eric will correct me. 

The Black Gap

We decided to head home via the Black Gap road, so name for the feature we are about to drive through. It has been really the only time we've felt the need to put on the 4 wheel drive. At that, we heard an ominous hissing and squealing, just like a tire being cut on a sharp rock as we neared the bottom, and we did have to stop and inspect it. 

Find the Sam

So can you see him trying to blend in with the rocks? I think that's the Sierra Quemada (and yes, I butchered the spelling) behind him. We were out on the river road camping, just east of the Mariscal Mine. It was a fun trip. We made a tarp taco of all our stuff and bungeed it onto the rack on top of our jeep. I think some of the pictures I've taken will show this, but I'm posting as I look through them. I think I mentioned this camping trip in a previous blog entry, so I'm not going into detail here. 

Prickly Pear Rose

I love these yellow roses, I think they are so pretty! 

Strawberry Pitaya

These are pitaya blossoms. They are one of my favorites, and I love the fruit they produce. I don't know how long it takes for them to ripen, but you bet I'll be out strawberry picking ASAP. 

Hurt!

Sam still calls a cactus a 'hurt' but pokes his fingers in them anyway. 

He's just so cute I can't help posting tons of pictures of him with the Strawberry Pitayas. 

Stop and smell the cactus roses? 

Awyn camps pretty well too!

We hauled out one piece of baby equipment with us, Awyn's new rocking chair. It's pretty solid, Sam likes it too. 

Good Morning!

Thank goodness for the time change, eh? Sam still rises with the sun. 

Sam's new Toy Box

Sam likes to play in his toy box. I'm pretty sure that's not what we had in mind, but it is a box, and it is called a toy box, so why can't the box be a toy? We're going to have problems keeping his toys inside the box. 

Awyn finds her Bling

Without any assistance, Awyn decorated herself with Mardi Gras beads. 

Awyn's New Hat

Awyn has new hats from Grandma Joyce, and she really looks cute in them. She liked helping Sam open his presents too. 

Sam's New Table

We decided that the kids needed a plastic table that was their size. We put it in the computer room so that they could play and color while we did computer and sewing type things. It sort of works that way. They both seem to really like it though. 

Sam's Birthday Cake

Sam loved blowing out his candles, and he loved the whipped cream and berries that went with the angelfood cake. He's not a huge cake fan, but loves frosing or whipped cream. 

Long Time No Blog

I've been lazy and keep forgetting to update this blog. Awyn is starting to try standing on her own, but only for a few seconds, and she has the most success when she does it accidentally. Speaking of dentally, she's teething again, and it looks like all top four teeth, starting with the front two. She's pretty miserable, and having a much harder time of it than her brother did. He also punched multiple teeth at once, but he rarely ever showed signs of discomfort. Awyn lets us know that it hurts.

Last night we went camping on the river road. We didn't change the batteries in the inflatible mattress, so we slept on the ground. Worse, I forgot a pillow. But we had a wonderful evening, watching the stars overhead, the mice on the ground, and playing with Sam until he announced that it was time for bed. We let him into the tent, he curled up on a sleeping bag, and promptly fell asleep. Awyn took a little more effort and time, but soon joined her brother.

We are working on weaning Awyn at night, which means that we are trying to let Eric take care of her when she wakes up. Some nights are better than others, and Eric is trying very hard to meet her needs at night.

We went up to Midland for doctor's appointments for the kids, and of course I forgot to write down the stats. Awyn is still just barely over 17 lbs, but we expected that. Sam is nearly 40 lbs, which is lighter than we expected, but it suits him just fine.

I had the tires rotated on the van at Sam's Club and they didn't get the lift low enough and tore some plastic bolts out of the front end, and we had to come up with a temporary fix, as the local parts stores don't seem to carry the right part. So after 3 hours of work, we finally got ready to finish our shopping and head home. That's an hour of Eric lying on the pavement in a parking lot, opening every package of plastic bolt in the shop, and 45 minutes of the manager of the shop trying to help us, eventually joining Eric lying on the ground, trying to make something fit, until he pulled a plastic tie out of another guy's pickup and tied our bumper back on. And a whole lot more time of me arguing with Sam's Club about liability and the fact that we simply didn't have any more time to go find a dealership (we were in Odessa, not familiar with where things are) and wait on them. I had to impress on them the fact that we still had a 4 hour drive home through raging thunderstorms, my husband was sitting in the van with two screaming kids, and would likely shred the next person wearing a vest to approach him, and we weren't going to come back until MAY, because we live 250 miles away. I especially loved the mechanic telling me to go to the dealership in Big Bend, since that's where we are from. Gotta love the clueless. I guess. So no resolution yet, the manager didn't want to refund our $15 tire rotation fee, but will let me fax her an estimate for repairs, and insists that it won't cost any more than $5. I tried explaining $50 in gas, $65 hotel room, 4 hours in a dealership waiting room, if lucky, with 2 very young children, 4 hours driving each way, etc. I'm not sure she understood just how inconvenient those cheap parts are really going to be. So now I don't know where we're going to buy tires from, as Sam's seemed to be the only place that carried the tires for the van at anything less than $150/tire, and at that I have to order them in advance. (tip here: Honda Odysseys take very expensive tires! and I thought we'd traded in a tire hog)